Tuesday 23 October 2012 10.31 EDT
First published on Tuesday 23 October 2012 10.31 EDT

Former BBC director general Mark Thompson has said he would be prepared to appear before MPs investigating the Jimmy Savile scandal, if they wanted to summon him to give evidence.

In a letter to Tory MP Rob Wilson seen by the Guardian, Thompson said he had not been asked to appear before the Commons culture, media and sport select committee but added he would be "very happy to attend" if asked.

Thompson also said he was "never formally notified" about Newsnight's Savile investigation, which he was only alerted to when a journalist questioned him about it at a drinks reception.

Sources confirmed that the journalist was BBC correspondent Caroline Hawley.

The former director general subsequently raised the issue with BBC news senior management, who told him the programme had decided not to proceed with the investigation on "journalistic grounds".

Thompson, who left the BBC in September and has taken up a new role as chief executive of the New York Times Company, said he has not yet been contacted by the corporation's review into the affair being overseen by former Sky News chief Nick Pollard. He said he had contacted the BBC to say he would be happy to help out in any way.

Thompson said the BBC's editorial policy department had a list of potentially sensitive programmes but it did not often include segments of long-running strands such as Newsnight or Radio 4's Today programme.

"As director general I saw this list regularly," he said. "I do not believe the Savile investigation was included on it. Certainly I do not recall seeing it there."

Thompson said the journalist had told him at the drinks reception last year "words to the effect of 'you must be worried about the Newsnight investigation?'"

Thompson said he never heard any allegations or received any complaints about Jimmy Savile during his time as director general. "His name scarcely came up at all during my years as DG," he wrote.

"I never worked with Jimmy Savile nor, to the best of my knowledge, worked on any programme or in any department where he had worked. Indeed, I don't believe I ever met him," he wrote.

"I understand that some people claim to have known about the allegations. I never heard them or indeed any allegations of anything either criminal or anti-social that he was said to have done. If I had, I would have raised them with senior colleagues and contacted police."

Wilson, the Conservative MP for Reading East, wrote to Thompson asking him about the Newsnight investigation and subsequent BBC inquiries.

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